The same day as the E.T house, we decided to take a stroll around Hollywood.

If you ever get the chance to go, don't bother, it's an utter s h i t hole. It reminded me of skegness, what with all of the tacky stores and tattoo parlours etc.



There were a couple of cool things to see, but nothing that really warranted the drive, despite it not being that far.



I noticed something on this pic that had us in tears when we downloaded it..can you spot it?

One thing that was worth the effort, was the fact that we got to watcha couple of really good breakdancing crews. I could watch that stuff all day long. i've been a hip hop and b' boying fan since I was about 14, and was pretty handy in thebreakdancing stakes when i was a youth. These guys were incredible though.

We rolled past Manns Cinese theatre, and quite how they make the whole thing look as glitzy on T.V as they do, is totally beyond me. Don'tget me wrong, the Theatre itself is very impressive,I just can't understand how they can make the turgid surroundings sem glamorous at all.

There was plenty of weirdness to be had though, and one guy dressed as Michael jackson stood rock still until you gave him some dough. Then he broke into some superfly MJ moves. This could be a good vocation for someone I used to work with, called Rob Wilkinson.





Shammmoooon!



Hollyweird




Only Dom will get this one!

You remember the first day I was here I told you all about that crazy dude that was going to ride his bike of a cliff. Well it turns out that he did it. Not only did he ride it of a cliff...he rode it of THE cliff to beat all cliffs. The Grand Canyon!

Turns out that he's a very experienced skydiver who designs his own high performance canopies (I think that means something to do with parachuting, not a go faster sun shade for the garden!).

It was only going to be his 7th ever base jump though, so he needed to get it right.

Things went well to start with, but what he hadn't reckoned on was the effect of the bike pulling him down as he tried to make enough space between it and himself to safely open his parachute. He fell 1200 feet before the bike went on its side, started to float from side to side like a feather and he made enough distance on it to deploy his big handkerchief!

Below are the pics of the wreckage that's in the local bike shop I was in when the crazy Hispanic dude was planning his stunt. There is literally nothing salvagable from it...not a single useful item.










If you look carefully, you can just see the remains of his ear sticking out of the mush...:lol:

Spent today mainly prepping the bikes for this weekend at Willow Springs. It'll be my 36th birthday on the First practice day, which is the Friday 15th. Happy boithdaaaay tooo meeeeeee!

I'm such a good lad, I even brought a pack of sponsors stickers with me to put on the bike, which is, incidentally, a 2003 R6 with 50,000 miles on it!. Uprated front forks, and an Ohlins rear shock. Braided lines and that's about it. It has a full arrow system, but isn't fitted with a power commander, so i don't know how much difference that'll make.

dude, i could have told you that meself! spent an entire day shooting (although mostly it was sitting around being brought food and drink...) to shoot what equated to around 20 seconds worth of on screen.


AHA!!! its your birthday tomorrow! er, our time... happy birthday Timbo! :D

Holy Shizzle!

Just got back from Willow Springs, and when they say it's the fastest road in the west, they really aren't kidding! It is totally unlike any circuit in the Uk.

I'll knock up a report over the next day or so, and I have plenty of pics to go with it.

Met some very, very cool people, and yanks can most certainly ride motorcycles in circles, not just straight lines. Nicky Hayden isn't a fluke and neither are the others.

Today I raced against top AMA supersport 600 riders Jason perez, Jeff tigert, Jeremy Toye (Just back from macau GP) etc and finished in some half decent spots. Woot for the UK! :)

More later.

Otei :)

Just as food for thought, the lap record is at an average speed of 113mph.

That's over a 2.5 mile course. It sure as s h i t doesn't feel like 2.5 miles!

:eek: :D

Got some interesting pics from the weekend, but thought that you peeps might like to see this.

It's a 900 Monster, named "frankenstein".

It's ridden by a nice Argentinian lad called Mauro, who incidentally, had heard of the Ducati sporting Club, and the desmodue series.

He said that he bought the engine from a guy called Domsk...oh no, wait...he he!

He's not been racing long, but seems to be going pretty quickly already, and was telling me all about the intricacies of riding a 160 MPH Ducati monster. Sounded like fun. I'm not too sure of any of the finer details about the bike as I was always running around somewhere or other, but took a few snaps anyway.

So then, the racing.

We set off to do a practice day on the Friday and I must confess that I was bricking it. I was wondering just what I had let myself in for, with tales of modern 600's and AMA riders frequenting the grids, I just didn't want to look a tit.

When we arrived we unloaded the pick up and set up the garage. Now the yanks don't have vans to transport stuff like we do (Shandra referred to them as "kidnapper vans", which cracked me up). They either have a pick up truck of varying largeness, or a large pick up and a cool trailer. If they've got plenty of cash, they have a bloody great big wagon that wouldn't look out of place in a BSB paddock.

Having signed on and gotten ready for the first practice, it was announced that one of the new riders had spilled oil all the way down the straight and through turn 1. This was exactly what I didn't need for learning the circuit on my first day, that awful feeling of going across the white cement line at speed and hoping the track workers have done their job right!



quite a few racers got out of their leathers and mucked in. I wasn't one of them, lazy git that I am

I had been introduced to one of the racers by Amy, called Ken Kramer. Ken also does the new racer school, so I tagged along for a few laps behind him to see what I could learn.

The first impression I got was of just how fast and open it is, with little or no reference points to speak of. turn one is down from 6th to 4th, then up to 5th for a long 180 degree right hander. This leads into a nasty little up and downhill section with terrible tarmac and weird cambers. Then it zings onto the back straight that leads into turn 8. Turn 8 is taken flat in 6th and then turns back in on itself, requiring you to go down a couple of gears as you're cranked over and try to aim it in the right direction so that you don't end up running off the track.

I came back in slightly intimidated, but hopeful I could learn it quickly.

Next session I followed Amy on her CBR 400 and was having a real hard time keeping up with her, even though I was on her R6. She doesn't hang around!

After a few sessions though, I started to get the hang of the place and was beginning to enjoy myself. The wind started to get quite blustery, and the place is notorious for catching out the unwary when it starts to get like that.Turn 8 and 9 weren't the sort of corners that you needed to have your front wheel blown from under you either!



Team topanga on Friday practice

By the end of the day, I'd managed to get my times down to a 1:35.5, which I was told is very respectable for your first day at the track, so I was pretty happy with that.

It was my birthday that day, and as I walked back to the garage later, I strolled in and they were there with a bunch of iced muffins with " happy 36th birthday Tim" written on them. It was a really nice surprise. I got a cool book from Amy about Black holes and time warps, by Kip S thorne.

Shandra, Amy's friend had also made me a T shirt. I'd commented to Amy that I'd seen a really cool logo on some webite, and wished I could get a T shirt with the logo on. It turned out that you couldn't. Shandra however, had used her considerable talents to recrate one just from a tiny little logo grabbed from a site. Thanks for that Shandra, you're a legend.

Shandra had also been to the Freddie Spencer riding school recently, and brought me and Amy some cool signed gear. Very nice indeed.



We weren't finished yet though apparently, and scooted off to a local Mexican restaurant for a bite to eat. After we'd eaten and partaken of more margeritas (I'll really need to hit the gym when i get back!) the waiters came out, plonked a big Sombrero on my swede and sang happy birthday to me again.






With our faces glowing from the combination of the desert winds and the booze,we then trotted over to the hotel and got some shuteye.

Saturday official practice.

Today I would get to practice with the guys I'd be racing against, which would either be a very good, or a very bad thing, depending on how quick they were. I was reassured that my progress was fine and that I'd be ok.

The weather was very, very different to the day before though, and we could actually see some snow on the upper mountains in the distance, such was the reduction in temperature.



Even Wyatt the dog had to wrap up warm.

After my first session, I was freezng my ass off, and couldn't get my head around riding the bike. It was clearly ok for riding though, and AMA superhero, Jason Perez proved it to me by coming around the outside of me in the flat out turn 8, with his knee kissing the deck in a chilly display of barely controlled lunacy. I was now extremely demoralised.

The chilly conditions didn't get any better, and at one point i went for a pee and nearly had a heart attack as I saw the size of my todger. I also thought I'd lost a knacker, such was the malteseresque nature of them at this freezing point in time. I couldn't lose my balls, I'd be needing them for the next day!

I had decided to wait until later in the day to fit a new set of tyres for the race and scrub them in. Sure enough, just as I was getting them swapped over (we only took one set of wheels) the heavens opened and it lashed it down.



After a while it became pretty obvious that there was no way I would be able to scrub the new tyres in and that the morning practice would be my only chance.



I had met a really nice bloke called Dave Moss at the track. dave's an ex pat, originally from Manchester. He now runs his own suspensionn tuning company, called Catalyst Reaction. He's gained alot of respect on the various race paddocks in the U.S, and works bloody hard, driving 60,000 miles a year to track days and race meetings. I wish him all the success in the world, he definitely deserves it.



Dave Moss, hardest working man in the paddock, and the only one in shorts!

We scooted off to another Mexican restaurant, but as we were sat down to order, Shandra got a phone call from a young lad that had fallen off and broken his collarbone earlier in the day whilst she was instructing him on his new racer school. (Just to be clear, she didn't instruct him to fall off, he managed that on his own) He had been fixed up by the hospital sooner than she thought, and downed tools and went off to pick him up without a second thought.

Me, Amy and Shandra's parner, Chris ordered some nibbles and waited for them to return.

Kyle came back sporting a lovely little sling. It turned out that he was in the Marines, and at just over 20 years old, had already been to Fallujah for 7 months, right in the thick of it. Brave lad, never made anything of it either.

I hadn't managed to lap as quickly as I had the day before, but then neither had anyone else, such were the conditions. It had been useful just to keep learning the track, but not for much else.

Oh yeah, i forgot to add that when we got to the hotel on the Friday night, we thought it was on fire as the L.A fire dept were there in force!



We never found out what was going on, but there was a prom night or something going on, so we figured that one of the girls had broken a nail or had a false eyelash trauma.

Sunday: Raceday.

Ok, this was it then. I'll be frank, I was terrified.

The weather was bright and clear, but still unbelievably chilly. We'd get 2 ten minute practice sessions in each class before a riders meeting (where they played the national anthem and gave respect to their troops in Iraq etc. I normally hate that sort of cheese, but it was quite touching) then the racing would get underway. Gulp!

I still had to scrub the tyres in, so I went out carefully and wobbled round, feeling like a 1st day rookie. It wasn't pretty. When I came in, Amy noticed that the tyres were wearing a little strangely, and had lips on the tread edges. I didn't think too much of it and went out for the second session.



Whaddya mean I look scared!

Having started to get more confident and faster on the bike, it was now blatantly clear that there was something amiss with the suspension. Whereby before, I could sail relatively smoothly around the turns, It was now like a little jackhammer, pattering from the rear just about everywhere.

I went to see Dave Moss, who came straight over and had a look at the tyres. One glance was all he needed to diagnose too much rebound damping. The cooler temperatures had affected the shock and it wasn't working the same as when it had been alot warmer, so we backed it off a couple of turns and I'd just have to hope that it was ok for the race.

Race number 4, the 600 Superstock came around far too quickly, and before I knew it, I was in the holding area, with my heart attempting to beat it's way out of my chest cavity.

It was a while since I'd been this nervous, and all I could think about was how fast this racetrack was, Kyle's broken collarbone and my total lack of medical cover for the race. This was starting to seem like a really irresponsible thing to be doing.

As soon as I got out on the warm up lap, the bike felt much better and I knew I had my race head on. The temperature was up quite a bit now, and things were much more like Fridays conditions. I lined up on the last row of the grid in 23rd place and waited for the start sequence. A guy raises a board with the number 2 on it, then flips it over to reveal a number 1, then turns it sideways, and after that, he can raise the green flag at any point to start the race.

I got a good start and used my elbows well enough in the first turn to clear a path through a few riders. I passed one around the outside in the 5th gear second turn and set my sights on the pack of 5 or 6 bikes ahead of me. I was riding calmly and seemingly pretty well, catching them and getting rid of them one by one until I came across a guy called Mark Hill....yes, really!...the difference is that this Mark Hill is a black guy. I took him into the steep turn 5, which I was pleased with as it was a tricky pass and set off after a gixxer 600 ahead of me. I caught him and slingshotted out of his slipstream into turn 1, but couldn't make it stick. After that, I couldn't make enough ground on him and crossed the line in 13th place.



The viper stripe roof lid on tour.

As I cruised around on the slow down lap, I got an immense sensation of elation. It's an unreal feeling to go and race total strangers in a foreign land 5000 miles away. I felt quite proud, and that in some lame way, I was representing our country. Stupid, I know, but i'm something of a romantic.

These guys race every month of the year at this track, and so get to become track specialists. I'd reduced my laptime to a 1:33.8, and was informed that it isn't the norm for people to do that on their first time at the track. Apparently, if you can regularly lap under the 1:30 bracket, you qualify for a pro licence. Maybe I'll try to do that next time, although I hear they're reducing it to 1:28...Hmmm!

The second race was quite soon after, being as it was number 7 and it was destined to be a bit of a disappointment as soon as the warm up lap started. However, It was pretty cool when the announcer mentioned me and the fact that I was "all the way from over the pond!"..he he..cool!

The temperatures had dropped again, and the chatter had returned. It wasn't as significant as the morning practice, but was enough to make the bike unpleasant to ride. I didn't get a great start, but managed to elbow my way through again and started to chase down the same guys I'd battled with in the first race. To be honest though, I didn't have enough pace and dropped off the back of them, deciding just to bring it home safely and make sure everything was in one piece for the laguna Seca trackday on the 26th.



They have Chavs in the states too it would seem!

As it turned out, there weren't quite as many on the grid for this race, and that, coupled with the fact that a few fell off, meant that I finished in 12th place, but with a laptime of 1:35 as my best.

Amy was racing her CBR 400 and just mised out on her first podium in one race, after a titanic battle with the guys at the front saw her slide in 4th by a wheel length. She made up for it later though as she stormed of into second place and put a gap on 3rd. The race was then red flagged and restarted, so she'd have to work at it again. She got a good start and battled away, eventually taking 2nd and her first trophy.



Woohoo..feels good!

It was a popular result and the commentator went bonkers. People were waiting in pitlane to give her a hug as she cam back in. It was a great moment and I was so pleased to have been there to witness her first trophy winning ride.



JC Gibbs, Amy and Ken Kramer.

After having a few drinks and chatting with people for a bit, we packed up and headed home. It had been an amazing weekend, and one that I'll never forget.

Something to consider, is that the Friday and Saturday practice, and my 2 races, had cost me the grand total of 150 quid. Couple that with the fact that petrol is 1.25 GBP for 4 litres, and it's a real eye opener.

I'd like to thank all of the people at the circuit that made me feel genuinely welcome and who were so good to me. I'll be back for more!

Most of all though, I want to say thank you to Amy, who has put so much time and effort into this that it makes me feel very humble. Thank you.

God I feel sick :barfy:

Is the 4th Ashes test on yet?

;)

Nice work though T.O.Tei

Private Joke
 

Tim,

Please excuse my silly question, but I just can't help myself...

I wonder, can you please tell me (and everyone else) what the racing is like
over the pond?

Many thanks

Your long long lost friend (mentally as well as physically - lost that is)

Domski :D

Why certainly young Dominic.

It's much the same as in the UK, only their leathers zip up the opposite way round.

I'm sure you'll find out sooner rather than later. ;)

Woo Hoo!!!

See you next T...

;)

Well I hope everyone had a lovely Christmas, mine was certainly the strangest, and definitely one of the coolest I've ever had, but I'll carry on where I left off, which was just before Christmas.

On the 22nd of December we went to Medieval Times, which those of you that have watched The cable guy, starring Jim Carrey will know is a sort of Theatrical swords and jousting type affair, combined with loads of booze and some food. In fact, this was the very one that they used in the film.



I'd really been looking forward to this, and It's difficult to put into words just how much I enjoyed it, but suffice it to say that when I came out I had it on a par with racing at Willow Springs...seriously, it was absolutely fantastic. If you ever get the chance to go, DO NOT pass it up. There are 5 located across the States.

We arrived, and the Medieval theme is instantly in effect, with everyone calling you Lord or my Lady. We had our goofy picture taken with the king, then went and had some seriously strong cocktails and beer.

You all get assigned a Knight to cheer for, and ours on this occasion was the black and whit Knight, and so we wore black and white striped crowns. Lame yet truly brilliant.



The show is quite an affair, run to a soap opera type storyline, with performing Andalucian stallions, Falconry and of course the jousting, swordfighting and target events. The guys that do this are serious athletes and really go at it when it comes to the swordfighting and such with sparks flying off metal as they seemingly try to cleave each others skulls! It's pretty clear that it's choreographed, but they still managed to make it convincing enough that a drunken Otei was hoarse and red raced having enthusiatically screamed his way through the majority of the evening. (I have excellent and hilariously embarrasing videos that demonstrate this to great effect).



They don't provide utensils to eat with, and you only get 1 napkin (so I went to the bog, grabbed a load of paper towels and supplied the entire front row with them). The food is very good, simple fare. Huge bits of chicken, potato, ribs, soup and a desert, with a couple of free beers each.



The best bit, was that on the night, our chap was the winner of the tournament, until he was bumped off by the evil, scheming Lord Chancellor (plot twist).



A totally awesome show, and i'll definitely go again, but this time i'll dress up and REALLY get into it!

It was going to be a busy few days, and the next day, we arranged to take a tour of the Griffith Observatory. This was the building that gained its initial mainstream fame from featuring in the James dean movie,"Rebel without a cause"



It was a beautiful day, and the views over L.A were spectacular with the Hollywood sign visible above and behind us.



Ther building itself has only recently reopened, after undegoing a 4 year, 93 million dollar refurbishment program. During this program, they added more space to the building by adding another floor below the existing one.

We didn't give any thought to how they had actually managed to achieve this until we watched a movie in the theatre there. It turns out that they actually lifted the entire building up on rams and excavated underneath it and then built what they needed. During the movie, the guy in charge of it casually declared that they had never done this beore, and that it was all theoretical stuff. I don't know how he slept at night!



There was all sorts of stuff in there for us space nuts and we merrily gawped at all the cool stuff, including their very own Tesla coil (not that it has anything to do with space). Tesla coils were invented by a guy called Nikolai Tesla, and initially they were an experiment in trying to make electricity go from one place to another without the need for expensive cables and routing. They were ultimately unsuccessful, but alot of the theories he came up with are in use inthe national electricity grids we use today.



At the end of the day, just as we were going to be making our way back down the hillside in the bus, there was this helicopter that came in really close to the cliffside. Amy took a pic that turned out really cool.



After this, we went to some friends house, where we changed into our posh gear (suit and tie and cocktail dress). We had managed to get an invite to a very exclusive hollywood club called the Magic Castle. As you may have guessed, It's a place where they have magicians. There are several bars and a restaurant where we had a very nice meal.

The place is a real rabbit warren, with corridors twisting here and there, and lots of little close up magic shows and other, larger displays. It was prettycool and I'd like to go back and spens a little more time there,checking out a few more of the shows.

Unfortunately, I have no pics, as cameras weren't allowed in the place. It has a website though:http://www.magiccastle.com

The next day was pretty much a chill out day, although we did have to load up the bikes in the truck, as we were setting off on Christmas day to Monterey where we would be doing a trackday at Laguna Seca. Now I've been wanting to do this since I was about 17, so to say i was a litle excited is putting it mildly.

The weather for the drive up next day was lovely, with bright sunshine and mid 70's temperatures.

I had heard stories about how spectacular the scenery was on the Pacific Coastal Highway, which as you may have guessed is the road that runs along the West coast of the United States. i wasn't disappointed by the tales, and the views and surrounding natural architecture were impressive, inspiring and somewhat intimidating all at the same time.



The journey was going to be between 6 and seven hours each way, so I took half of the driving duties and have probably logged about 400 miles in the U.S now. I must confess that I wa pleased Amy was driving when we were on some of the tight and twisty PCH roads, that were lined with possible rock slides and precarious cliff drops on the other side. You would really want to be very used to any vehicle you were driving up there, and how some people get Motorhomes around there without suffering brain meltdown is beyond me.



At the start of the journey, we had stopped off to get some petrol. As I was driving and about to navigate my way back onto the Freeway, a Mexican looking guy leaned out of his truck that was parked alongside us and shouted "hey buddy, what kind of bikes are those?..touring bikes?" What with my mind being preoccupied with being on the right side of the road, I just gave him the standard and honest reply "No mate, they're race bikes" Amy was slightyl less charitable though, and let loose with "What kind of Moron are you, Mexican or South east asian Moron?". I don't think he heard her to be honest, but we were both cracking up for miles after that.

On the way we stopped off at the campest restaurant/bar you have ever seen in your life. It's called the Madonna Inn, and is extremely pink and covered in lights. It's a pretty impressive joint though and has some unreal stuff inside...including a mens urinal that is like a mini waterfall!







We were still on the PCH as the sun was going down, and to be honest, although the final 120 miles was hard going concentration wise, we both considered ourselves really lucky to be able to see such an amazing sight on Christmas day of all days.



After 7 hours including stops, we hit Monterey and signed in at the Otter Hotel.

We were obviously going to be missing Christmas dinner, so we decided to bring our own from the delicious resourses of Gelsons Deli. We started with a lovely waldorf salad and Prawns and the for a main course we had pecan encrusted and parmesan topped chicken breast, with candied yams, stuffing, cheese potatoes and a delicious chiken pasta. we followed thi with some cake that we bought at the Madonna inn, all washed down witha lovely bottle of red wine.

Before we left, amy asked me if I wanted to look at the weather forecast for Laguna. I declined, said that it would do whatever it was going to do whether we looked or not, and that I didn't want to be depressed about it if it said rain. As it turned out, it was fortunate that we didn't look, as the forecast was for a terrential downpour!

I was amazed how well I slept, considering that I'd be ticking one of life's major boxes the next day, but I was also glad, as I figured that Laguna was going to be a pretty physical track, and I haven't seen a gym in over a month.

It was dark when we set off from the hotel, so it was hard to see what the weather was up to, but it was dry, and that was what counted. As the skies brightened, we could see that it was slightly overcast, and it looked like it might start to drizzle. I tried to remain upbeat, but was now itching to get the briefing over and done with and get onto the track.



The organisers, Red Shift, were very nice, extremely helpful and not at all bolshy. Something else of note, is that Laguna is very much like Brands GP, in that they only get about 5 dates a year for trackdays. The day had cost the equivalent of 150 quid, and they even chucked in a really nice lunch (there was loads of really nice food, but I just had a small plate of chicken and salad). I can't ever imagine getting that here, even if I had paid 250 for a brands GP trackday.



There was a guy there doing onboard video for $95. Fortunately, Amy knew him (Brant WiWi,WSMC No1 plateholder, great name too!) and he owed her a favour, as she had taken care of everything when he'd had a major off at a track and smashed his hand up. She basically organised for all his stuff to make it home etc. He announced that he would be giving away a half price video session to one of the lucky punters. Imagine our surprise when he called my name out. Nice one Brant!

So then, to the track. we went out in the fast group, as I'd always rather be the slowest in the fast group, than amongst a bunch of people who weren't sure whether they were quick or not. At least you were in experienced company.

Now it isn't very often that I go to a track, do one session and not at least know where the track goes, but wether it was a combination of the high anticipation and the technical layout of the track or what I don't know. But when I came in off the first session, I had no clue where the bloody track went at all! This unerved me slightly, as I only had another 2 sessions before we'd arranged to do some video work. I didn't want to look like a nobber.



The next session was much better, the sun was out and I started to get a feel for the track. I was slightly worried that I'd be disappointed. I needn't have bothered, it's awesome. I wouldn't say that it's any more spectacular than Cadwell..in fact I'd go so far as to say that Cadwell is a little crazier, but there are places where you really have to know where you're going in order to go quickly, and I instantly saw why Rossi couldn't win there straight away, it's pretty unique.



The 3rd session was better still, and I now felt as thoughI was ready to at least look half decent on the bike video. The corkscrew is cool, and not as intimidating as some would have you believe. I think the part that was intimidating is the fact that there's a large area of sealer where the track has been repaired at the top, and it doesn't look as though it would offer any grip whatsoever. The real intimidating part is the braking zone, which is very difficult to get absolutely right.

At this point, a mate of mine, Dave Wallis turned up. I met dave when I sold him a CBR 400 cyinder head over a year and a half ago, but hadn't hooked up in realtime yet, so it ws cool to meet him. truth be told, he's the original reason I managed to get over here, so I owe him a great debt. I'd like to get him racing in the UK next year as well as Amy, so I may be trying to blag spare bikes left right and centre!

One of the best things about the entire day, was that there were quite a few people attending that had been racing at Willow Springs, so i felt like I was in friendly company straight away.



One of these people was a crazy guy called Tim Martinez. Tim's a great bloke, and very funny. His SV 650 says everything about the man that tends to wander around in a carhaart one piece "bearsuit" and a santa hat most of the time. It has it's own wooden dash, stickers from everywhere all over it, graffitti, and even 3 rubber ducks named after each member of the glam rock band, Kiss. Awesome.



Willow Springs Superbike rider Robbie Dowie was there, as was Jason Perez and several other faces I recognized.

After lunch, It was time for me to perform in front of the camera. I didn't give it much thought untilI rolled up to Brant and we were about to set off, then the pressure seemed enormous. Fortunately, I rode smoothly and at what I figured was an extremely respectable pace for what was my 4th session on the track. I was pretty beat when i came in and rolled up alongside Brant. He asked me if I wanted the good news or the bad news.



The good news was that I was one of the quicker people he'd video'd, which made it more fun for him. The bad news was that the camera had packed in after the 3rd corner!...AARRRRGGHHHH!

I had been so relieved with how it had gone, and to be told that we'd have to go and do it all again was a little frustrating, but never mind. Sure enough, the next session came around, and I tried to focus on a few points that Brant had mentioned might make me go quicker.

I didn't think I rode as well as the first session, but Brant said that my lines and corner speed through some of the turns had improved and that I seemed to have actually taken notice of what he'd said and put it to use immediately, which was rare as folk usually revert back to what is comfortable. Perhaps this is why I didn't feel as fast, but whatever the case, we got the footage and I'll try to get it uploaded somewhere at some point.

The last session was just a bit of a muck about, grinding kneesliders and having a blast. I really like left handers, and turn 5 is a fast sweeping uphill left with great grip and good camber. I hardly ever wear out kneesliders, but I knackered the one on my left knee through that turn. Awesome!





So then, to summarise: laguna was a slight disappointment as far as the facility itself was concerned. I thought it would be a bit grander, but the track is amazing and I can't wait to go back one day and improve the areas that needed work.

I simply can't tell you how lucky we were with the weather. It was perfect all day, then about 20 minutes after we'd done our last session, it totally hammered down. really dodged a bullet that day.



We went out that night and had a great meal with Tim Martinez, his partner Tracy and Dave Wallis and his friend Carrie. It rained all night. Phew!

You're up late Ian!

Thanks for the kind words mate, I sometimes wonder if people are interested or not. I don't wish it to come across as if I'm rubbing peoples noses in it. I'm just having a great time and wanted to share the experience. It's also so that my family and friends can keep an eye on me! ;)

Good skills on the potential loan of your bike, I'd love to be able to repay the people for what they've helped me achieve.

Got to come back on the 1st though. Bummer!

Cheers,

Tim :)

The day after the trackday, we went to see the famous Monterey bay aquarium as it was only a few hundred yards from our hotel.

It was now really windy and the weather was awful. Once again I thanked my lucky stars that the highlight of my trip hadn't been ruined by rain.

The aquarium is a great place, particularly if, like me, you were fascinated by underwater nature programs as a kid. I used to sit for hours watching Jaques Cousteau and the like as they sailed their way around the world. The visit to the aquarium has really made diving something that I want to do, but at the right place and time. Like winter in Australia for example!

We started our way through the aquarium, and there was a mega jellyfish exhibit. we then found ourselves face to face with the centrepiece of the building, the million gallon tank.



The first thing we saw was this huge Sunfish. It was so cool, it looked like it had dropped in from the Jurassic period for a quick swim around. Unreal. There were also some gigantic Tuna, some barracuda, reef sharks and the showpiece, a real, live Great White shark. The Great White was only a baby, and to be honest, the Sunfish and tuna were just as impressive in different ways, but it was cool to see one close up in the flesh. I now want to do a cage dive with it's older brothers and sisters even more badly!



The very friendly Giant Sunfish.



Look, It's a Great White..WOOOT!

There was a load of other cool stuff, including a large Kelp forest display, and some hilariously entertaining Sea Otters. It's a definite must see if you're in the area.



I drove half the way home, and we decided to try and cut across country to avoid the traffic that would pile up in Santa barbara by taking the 198 across to the 5. The 198 was like the land that time forgot, and the only clue that we weren't in the wild west, was the ribon of modern tarmac ahead of us. There were old buildings and farms that looked like they housed a load of Waltons clones. Weird but cool.

The weather then turned really nasty, with mega winds and rain that forced the 5 to have lanes closed down in the opposite direction due to mudslides, so you aren't having all the crappy weather to yourselves in the UK!

It's nicer today in Southern cali, but still windy!

Hmmmmm!

Sat reading this for something to do as the Mrs is off to a Prodigy concert.

I REALLY need to get my act together and organise another adventure for next year.

Trip to Vegas, ride Paruhmp racetrack (one of the smoothest in the universe apparently) go to Bodie ghost town, race at Infineon...and whatever else i can cram into a couple of months.

I do believe I'll start researching stuff :)